felser

Great analysis and reminder, thanks! Not sure if this was before or after - it was all 1957, I believe. Probably my favorite Monk album of all.

Some of the Real Gone stuff sounds fine, they got better at it as the years went on (and they had better sources to pirate). Not Now is the worst of the worst in every regard. But yeah, there are plenty of cruddy sounding Euro PD labels, such as "Prestige Elite: and even some cruddy sounding Euro "legit" labels (looking at you, Hallmark)

That would be Alfred Lion's sale of the label to Liberty in 1967. They continued to put out a lot of great music, but also a much higher percentage of disposable music. Then, when Liberty sold out to UA, the new music continued to weaken (though again, with some notable exceptions, such as the late McCoy Tyner and Elvin Jones tites, and some of the Bobby Hutcherson titles). Though UA did unearth a lot of incredible unreleased or long out of print material in three glorious campaigns through about maybe 1980. We won't talk about the mid-80's relaunch to the present, which to me is a whole different label, for which I don't have great regard.

Very impressive stuff - master musicians with quite a history prior to becoming ARS

I'm the same way. I have a couple of these to fill gaps (Zoot Sims, pre-Impulse Archie Shepp, early Verve Jimmy Smith, pre-Contemporary Phineas Newborn), but generally avoid them. Even Real Gone are better than these (those at least list recording year and personnel), and Avid are much much better. As for Blue Note, like you, I buy the BN issues whenever I can (few exceptions are a couple stray Jimmy Smith titles and some Three Sounds). Even Blue Note on Mosaic doesn't feel "right" to me, I like having the original artwork and liner notes, etc.

There was a box set released a few years ago that had their entire run, and it was really inexpensive. I just looked it up, I paid $42 (including shipping) for the entire 30 CD set. Still available on discogs and amazon for about $2/CD "The Charlie Parker Records Complete Collection". The source material was not recorded well, so all the fancy Japanese remastering in the world is not going to make it an audiophile delight. https://www.discogs.com/sell/release/5433565?ev=rb https://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B006ZUKBJ4/ref=tmm_acd_used_olp_sr?ie=UTF8&condition=used&qid=1574090376&sr=1-1

Bartz is not on Asante, that's Andrew White. I agree he sounds great on Expansions and Extensions. Sama Layuca is a wonderful album, though Bartz's contributions don't jump out in my memory.

Yes, low end European PD label.

They sound OK, but the packaging is the worst of the worst. Don't even have personnel listed. Very low-quality feel to them, though that is a really cheap price if you order enough for the free shipping.

He was his own man. I first heard him on his Strata-East album, didn't really hear 'Spirit Man' and the stuff in that vein for a few more decades. 'Spirit Man' gives you one side of him, 'In Harmony' (the Strata-East album) gives you another side of him. They're both gonna cost you more than you want to pay, so start on youtube.

To me, McCoy Tyner had the same effect on his 70's sax players. Azar Lawrence was the last one that didn't get overwhelmed. Players as strong as Bartz and George Adams just went under, let alone poor Joe Ford. Sonny Fortune did the best with him.

I'm very partial to the later Patrick Roques covers. Granted, Reid Miles was the originator, but I've long felt that Roques does Reid Miles even better than Reid Miles did.

I'll admit, I have not spent tons of hours listening to the Post-BB stuff, even though I own it. I "admire" it more that I like it, parts of "Get Up With It" and the "Right Off" side of Jack Johnson, as well as some parts of "Big Fun" being probably the biggest exceptions.

All the sax players he hired then seemed to lose whatever made them individual. Hard for me to tell Gary Bartz from Sonny Fortune, and that shouldn't be.

Hard to judge what is considered "lesser known". McCoy Tyner made majestic records that sold nothing. The Tyrone Washington album is great, especially the work of Joe Chambers on it. Andrew Hill made what I consider his best albums. Bobby Hutcherson recorded gems with Harold Land and others. As mentioned, the Elvin Jones albums are wonderful, with 'Coalition' being a special favorite for me. When Horace Silver skipped the vocals, he recorded really good albums. The two Lee Morgan 2LP sets are awesome. Wayne Shorter recorded beautifyul, challenging music. Hank Mobley recorded some of the best albums of his career. John Patton, especially, but also Reuben Wilson recorded some wonderful organ jazz. Jackie McLean's 'Demons Dance" is classic. Take whatever you consider to be "lesser known" from that list as my recommendations.

Imagine being 23 years old, new to NYC, unrecorded, and you're suddenly leading a group of Freddie Hubbard and the 1961 John Coltrane rhythm section, even just for a night or whatever. Man, would love to hear/see recordings of that. I do know that Harper sounded pretty great in 1968, from the Art Blakey/Jazz Messengers recordings that are around, so he probably sounded good in 1966, too.

To the best of my knowledge, Simmons is still alive. Did I miss an obit? The Simmons/Donald idea is great, and would include Rumasuma.

Sonny Simmons. Something that will include 'Rumasuma' in its parameters. I'm of course full in for Roach, Harper, Barron, Waldron.

I have always liked the production on that album, but the (excellent) Love and Mercy movie shows the circumstances to be harrowing.

Ok I'll do December since apparently I Can run but I sho can't hide 😀

"Time Seller" is something of a ringer, featuring Winwood's replacement, the excellent Eddie Hardin.

Agreed on the musical assessment. My wife is able to "get" his music. We saw him at the Painted Bride Art Center in (I think) the late 90's (Eddie Henderson, Francesca Tanksley, et al), and we still talk about it. And he radiated such personal dignity. I didn't get to meet him at all. I can't even begin to "objectively" rate him because his music strikes me more deeply than any other musician's, and only 70's McCoy Tyner and 70's Charles Tolliver and 70's/80's Hannibal have come even close to that experience for me. I appreciate the masters. In some ways, I feel and breathe Harper.

The Mosaic was 4 discs, but would have fit on three. That was my first-ever complaint about Mosaic apart from their LP-only issues in the early days. You can get the entire Mosaic set contents except for 3 cuts by buying the 2CD Blue Note "Complete Quartets with Sonny Clark" set and the "Born to Be Blue" CD. The three missing cuts are easy to cover, . "Count Every Star" is on Ike Quebec's "Blue and Sentimental" album, and the latinish "Grenada" and "Hey There" are bonus cuts on Green's "The Latin Bit" CD. And those two cuts are total musical outliers on the Mosaic set. So you can save a good bit of $ and get the same music in what I consider a more pleasing form by skipping the Mosaic and buying the other three titles, but I do understand collecting . I know this info well because I went through the exercise of replacing my Green-Clark Mosaic when the 2CD Blue Note set came out in the late 90's. That being said, the music on that Mosaic was a revelation when I bought it upon release in 1990.

Clifford, congratulations and blessings. So happy for you and your father on so many levels for this. Not just the music, but the love, the experience, the affirmation, the memories created. Look forward to seeing/hearing some in the future. I've heard Filano, he's a monster on the bass.